A friend of mine recently gave me a "Coventry Eagle" bicycle. It was his dad's old racing bike he picked up in Europe and it was now going to be thrown away. Everything on it is Campagnolo except the Cinelli bars/stem and Kyokuto pedals. I've done some research but I thought you guys could probably help me out a lot or atleast point me in the right direction to discover more about the history of this bike or its place in the world today (what people are doing with them, if they're good bikes, if they'd be in demand at all etc..). The bike was a mess but I've taken it completely apart and cleaned it up pretty well (I have not touched the wheels yet). The wheels are Campy Nuovo Record hubs laced to tubular mavic rims, Campy cotterless three armed cranks (9/16 x 20f), Cinelli (ModGiro Ditalia 64) Bars, Cinelli Milano stem, "Vicenza" Campy shifters, Campy chromoly fork, "Velox" Campy rear derailleur, one rear Weinmann 610 brake, Kyokuto Pro Ace pedals, campy headset, Campy 68-SS-120 BB. The bike was without a seatpost, saddle, brake levers, or a front brake. Any information on this bike would be great because I don't know anything about it!

thanks!

p.s. in the picture with the stem and fork on the frame it is without a headset and is assembled just for looks!

Impressive find!

Have you tried Classic Rendezvous? They have a Coventry Eagle page.

You can also search the Classic Rendezvous Archives using Coventry Eagle as your search term. If you join the Classic Rendezvous list serve (the source for the archives), you can ask about it there as well...

Should rebuild up well. Here is a case where the crankset is worth more than the whole bike would fetch, for some reason, probably the chrome or all the folk rebuilding black Raleigh Competitions those cranksets from time to time garner more money than Nuovo Record sets.

The hubs by the way are Nuovo Tipo, the second line, good but not NR. The shifters are Sport. The front derailluer is NR, the Rear is the notorious Valentino. An interesting spec. I bet original save the bars and pedals.

Get thee to the Classic Rendezvous Archives and you will find a wealth of information written by Nigel Land. And you can post to him directly, he's working on a history of Coventry Eagle. Coventry Eagle later combined with Falcon and under the leadership of Ernie Clements became a big name in bike design. You'll notice a close family resemblence between your bike an a 1960's Falcon.

For some reason the red metallic paint used on my bike seems very thin and will rub off easily. Testor's red metallic paint will do a decent job of matching your bike if you want to touch up those scratches. That's a nice bike you have. Put it together and ride it and see how you like it before you consider parting it out. You might like it. These bikes also have generous clearances allowing you fenders and a wide choice of tire sizes.

I agree with the owner that the rear derailleur and shifters are Velox. The Valentino that I've seen have longer parallelograms and the adjusting screws are spaced farther aprt. The Valentino cage shape for the jockey pulley is not as pointed and the upper pivot housing is shaped slightly different.

Owner stated the shifters as Vicenzia, that is just Campagnolo's home town. In closer review, the rear mech. is Velox as it has the shorter cage, but the basic design of both this and the Valentino is notorious, the fishermen in San Pedro loved them, they sparked to attract fish ans were a good line weight to boot.

sorry for the kick but i was looking for Velox info and found this post

I don't know why i missed this topic 6 weeks ago but this bike is beautifull! I read your topic in the ss & fixed corner where they had their fun we at c&v would be upset when you would fix it LOL

what's your final plan? I would love to see the bike complete! And that headbadge.. rrrrr

Do a search on Falcon--the history is on their site

Noticed your comments on your Dads Bike. I bought/have a red Coventry Eagle. I bought it around 1970 wholesale for $172. My son was going to tune it about 20 years ago and never finished it. Its been setting with the crank removed and the cables disconnected. It has a few scratches. The tires, brake shoes are the only things not original. I changed the crank, as I lived in a hilly area of Seattle (Magnolia). Would love to see yours finished. Want to start biking again and was debating to put it together or buy a FB new bike, like a Kona Dr Dew and refurbish the Eagle later.

I just bought a Coventry Eagle at a thrift store for $19.95!! How do I tell what year mine is?

I bought a Coventry Eagle brand new in around 1954. On day one I was 30 miles from home when the ball race in the front wheel hub broke up and I was stranded. I got it fixed but never trusted it after that and as soon as I could afford it, changed it for a Holdsworth Cyclone which I loved for several years and thousands of miles of training and racing